The Fusionist Book 3 -- Chapter 26

Chapter 26

Larek ended up working straight through for the next few hours, before he nearly passed out after having yet another meal of cooked Squirrel. Thankfully, by the time he was done, he managed to finish everything he had intended to do – as well as a few things he didn’t even think of suggested by the others.

To finish off what was needed for the Mages in the group, Verne went out and gathered a few pieces of wood that he helped to shape into long, straight staves that Larek was able to convert into weapons for each Mage. Because they didn’t need to have boosts or healing on them anymore, he added two projectile Effects – one on either end – which included Icy Spike, Water Stream, Flying Stone, or Flaming Ball all at Magnitude 7; it all depended upon what they preferred. Since Kimble was already adept at casting fire-based spells, he chose Water Stream (to help put out some of his fires if he didn’t care to use a spell) and Flying Stone, both of which would help to expand his repertoire. Nedira also chose Water Stream but went with Flaming Ball, while both Verne and Norde chose to add Icy Spike and Flaming Ball.

Those Fusions were located on the ends of the staves, while approximately two-thirds of the way down the staff was something he placed that would add yet another layer to their protection: Camouflage Sphere +6. He would’ve made both the projectile Effects and the Sphere larger in Magnitude, but the three of them were already pushing the limits of their area of ambience when they were in effect – especially when he added a Strengthen Wood +7 Fusion in between the Camouflage Sphere and one of the projectiles Effects. It wouldn’t do anyone any good if the staves broke easily, so the Strengthen Wood Effect was necessary.

Eventually, when he was able to make Advanced Fusions, he would be able to combine more of these types of Effects together into a single Fusion, meaning that he could add more; for now, this was about the limit of his capabilities.

As for Bartholomew, his leather and steel-plated armor was fully decked-out in Fusions, as Larek was able to use his Focused Division Skill to do multiple pieces at once. The leather portions obtained a Multi-Resistance Leather +2 Fusion, which was less than he’d like, but there were so many different unconnected pieces along his chestpiece and helmet (which also received a Healing Surge +3 Fusion), as well as being near steel plates, that the areas of ambience would otherwise overlap. The steel plates over his vitals were enhanced with Strengthen Steel +5, meaning that they would be able to take a lot of damage before they were compromised.

The only exception to his work were the Shieldguard’s pants, which were made from two large pieces of leather that he was able to add a pair of Multi-Resistance Leather +5 Fusions, a dual Strength and Body Boost +10 on the left leg, and an Agility Boost +10 on the right leg, and – because it didn’t fit anywhere else – Repelling Barrier +10 on his buttocks.

His wood and steel shield, an upgrade to what he’d used in the past, contained multiple dual Strengthen Steel and Wood +7 Fusions that he was able to place where the two intersected in its construction, which would help him block a lot of damage from getting through to him.

Lastly, his spear received something he hadn’t thought of until the young Martial trainee mentioned it.

“In addition to making the spearhead sharper and stronger, as well as strengthening the shaft, would you be able to add some sort of magical effect to it?” he had asked.

“Like what? Flames?”

Bartholomew shook his head. “What about some sort of ranged attack? The one drawback from my Specialization is that I have nothing to attack monsters from afar; I have to wait for them to come to me or I have to move to them. If I’m staying back, guarding you for instance, then moving out of position could be dangerous; being able to hit any threats from a distance could be useful.”

“I… think I can do that.”

As a result of that conversation, the Shieldguard now had an Icy Spike +7 on the butt of his spear. Larek would’ve liked to have it on the pointy end, but that already had a Strengthen and Sharpen Steel Edge +7 Fusion for the spearhead, so on the butt end was the best compromise he could figure out. Thankfully, Bartholomew was dexterous enough with his fingers that he was able to twirl the staff around in his hand so that he could quickly switch between the ends without hurting himself, so it wasn’t that big of a deal.

Vivienne got the full treatment of Multi-Resistance Leather +7 on her outfit of leather armor, as well as adding Repelling Barrier +10, Healing Surge +3, and +10 boosts to her stats where he could fit them in. The knives she possessed received Strengthen and Sharpen Steel Edge +7 to them, but instead of having them with a Permanent Activation Method, Larek made them Activatable at her insistence. It didn’t make sense until he realized where they were held on her body – her back, around her waist in a pair of sheathes – and that the necessary Fusions for the leather sheathes to ensure she didn’t accidentally cut herself would be difficult to juggle with areas of ambience. In addition, she wanted to be able to use them as “normal” knives if she wanted to, which didn’t make any sense to him, but he did it anyway. It wasn’t that big of a difference, after all, and an easy switch during the Fusion process.

Her bow received a Multi-Resistance Wood +7 Fusion, another new Fusion for Larek, but having become familiar with the Fusion by that point it wasn’t that difficult of a change. Strengthen Wood wouldn’t work on the bow because that would’ve made it unable to bend, but the resistance-based Fusion worked well enough to help prevent damage from external sources, as well as lessen the strain of overuse and pulling too hard – especially since it would take the Ranger a little while to accustom herself to her new, higher-magnitude Strength Boost.

Her arrows, on the other hand, received a Strengthen Wood +5 Fusion on their shafts and Strengthen and Sharpen Steel Edge +5 Fusions on their arrowheads. Or at least most of them did; Vivienne also had an idea that she wanted to test out with Larek’s help.

“In training, most of the time that I’ve failed to hit my target – typically other trainees – was because they were able to see it coming. With a high enough Agility stat, it was easy enough for them to dodge my arrows when they see them coming, and even snatch them out of the air if they were paying attention well enough. The same could be done by monsters who are fast enough, and there are plenty of them out there.” She paused dramatically for a moment. “But what if they weren’t able to see their death coming for them?”

“What do you mean?”

She pointed toward the robes that Larek had finished up earlier. “I saw that invisibility effect that you put on there; do you think that would work on one of my arrows?”

He had to think about it for a moment. He had originally created the Fusion to hide a person, but in reality it simply camouflaged a certain area around the formation’s location. Theoretically, it could be used on a smaller object like an arrow, though how well it would work was anybody’s guess.

“I can try, but you saw them moving around?” he asked. “It’s not exactly invisibility; the Camouflage Sphere bends the light around the area and is affected by movement, so they would still see some sort of distortion.”

“That’s better than nothing,” she said, shrugging.

Thankfully, with the area needing to be camouflaged being so small, he only needed a Magnitude 1 Camouflage Sphere to cover the entire arrow. Once she had it in hand, the Ranger activated the Fusion and shot it toward a nearby tree; Larek heard it whistle through the air and the *thunk* as it buried itself in the tree trunk, but he only saw the barest of distortions as it flew.

“Not bad. I think I’ll take a few of those.”

And that’s how she got her “invisible” arrows. In fact, she liked them so much that one of her leather boots were downgraded in their Multi-Resistance Leather protection and a Camouflage Sphere +5 Fusion was added to it, allowing her to move around even better without being seen in her scouting forays.

Lastly, Penelope had absolutely no modesty as she stripped down and gave every scrap of clothing and armor to Larek for him to work with. Desperately ignoring the buff, incredibly naked blue-haired woman standing in the middle of the cave waiting for him to “work his magic” on her stuff, he got the process done in record time.

“Norde; stop staring,” he heard at one point coming from Nedira.

“I-I-I can’t! She’s just so—”

He vaguely heard an argument coming from the two for a few minutes, while Penelope looked on with amusement written all over her face, but Larek was somehow able to keep his concentration on his work. In the end, her armor and clothing got the usual resistance, boost, healing, and protective barrier Fusions as the others, with nothing extra asked as far as those went. The only special request she had was for her oversized sword in addition to making it stronger and sharper – and it was unusual, to say the least.

“You want what?” he asked, incredulously.

“You know, that, uh, paralysis thing you use in your new healing Fusion.”

It took him a second to understand what she was saying. Thankfully, she was fully dressed again by that point, so he could concentrate. “You’re talking about Localized Anesthesia?”

“Yeah, I guess so. Do you think you can apply just that to my sword? Make it so that I can activate it and anything I touch with it is paralyzed?”

He immediately started to shake his head, but then he thought about it. In reality, he thought he might be able to do it, as all he’d have to do would be to eliminate the healing Effect from the Fusion he had created, and then increase the Magnitude of the Anesthesia so that it affected the entire body…

“I can do it, but the paralysis effect would only be active when your sword blade is touching their body. In addition, if it was used against someone who knew what was causing the paralysis, they could deactivate it with a thought.”

“Not a problem. That would still be incredibly effective against most monsters.”

In the end, the Fusion was so simple that it was only a 2-by-2 grid formation, making it a Basic Activatable Fusion that would push the Effect behind the Localized Anesthesia spell through an entire body. Or at least as much of the body it could influence with a +10 Magnitude; he suspected that if it was used against something massive like a dragon, it would only affect a small section of their body temporarily. In addition, it wasn’t designed to be used against non-biological monsters, so something like the Treedin he fought back in Crystalview, or the Lava Oozes he saw coming from the Scission that accompanied the Gergasi’s arrival would be entirely unaffected.

New Fusion Learned!

Paralytic Touch +10

Activation Method: Activatable

Effect: Sends a paralyzing pulse through a biological body at a touch

Magnitude: Affects target bodies weighing up to 1,000 lbs.

Mana Cost: 75,000

Pattern Cohesion: 1,150

Fusion Time: 157 hours

When she used it against Bartholomew, who volunteered as a test subject despite Larek’s objection, he immediately started collapsing to the floor of the cave as he lost all control of his body. The moment his hand left the flat of the blade where he touched it, his control came back, but the abrupt loss of any feeling throughout his body – and being unable to manipulate anything – for even a half-second was enough to send him to his knees before he recovered.

“That’s just cheating, you know that?” he complained. His complaints were even louder when he realized he peed a little as he lost control of his bladder for a half-second, but was able to recover fast enough that the floodgates didn’t fully open.

“Yeah, but I also have to ensure to hit your bare skin – how often is that going to happen in a friendly bout?” Penelope asked, gazing at her newly Fusioned sword as if she was in love with it.

“Stop looking at it like that or I’m going to get jealous,” Vivienne teased, smacking her on the back of the head lightly. The blue-haired Striker ignored the blow and sighed, before abruptly turning around to scoop the Ranger up in her arms, planting very noisy kiss on her lips.

“Nothing could replace you, babe,” she said with a smile, and Larek had to look away, feeling a little uncomfortable as he noticed Nedira staring at him. He wasn’t exactly sure why he felt uncomfortable, but he was too tired to mentally investigate it after all the Fusions he’d created.

For now, it was time to sleep; he figured he’d have time to think about it when they were on the move the next day.

Thankfully, the next morning, he felt largely recovered from all of the events with the Squirrels and Fusions he’d created. He was also adjusting to the repurposed wooden armlets, as he had added small Martial stat boosts to them; they weren’t needed for their original purpose anymore since those Fusions were now on his robe, but he also needed to work on the physical side of his nature coming up. He started with smaller Magnitudes because he wasn’t sure how his body would react to them, and he was glad that he did; even a Magnitude 1 boost to his Strength, Body, and Agility stat was difficult to accustom himself to.

It just felt… strange, if he was being honest with himself, as if his physical body was rejecting the boosts as if it was a foreign invader. Over time, though, he could feel it adjusting and accepting the boosts, but it was going to take a little longer before he could equip something like the +10 Magnitudes that the other possessed. He could handle them without paralyzing himself, at least; more than a few minutes of contact filled his entire being with pain, however, and he knew such things were a long way off for him. Magnitude 1 was his limit for now.

Despite that, he was feeling better about their journey than he had at the start, as he had done everything he could to protect his friends from the dangers that were sure to confront them along the way. It was with that positive thought process that they left the cave the following morning, packing up as much of the leftover cooked Squirrel meat as they could before they left, and ventured back into the trees on their way to Whittleton.